A good editor is an author's best friend. One of the biggest advantages to working commericially (as most of my books are) is that I have the services of experienced professional editors. And thank goodness, too!

There seem to be two main reasons self-published authors eschew the services of an editor. The first is that they cannot afford to hire one. The second is the entirely erroneous belief that an editor will rewrite their book. That is not what editors do, though. No professional editor will change as much as a punctuation mark. What they do is suggest to the author what changes or corrections need to be made. It is then up to the author to implement them.

A good editor is an author's best friend. One of the biggest advantages to working commericially (as most of my books are) is that I have the services of experienced professional editors. And thank goodness, too!

There seem to be two main reasons self-published authors eschew the services of an editor. The first is that they cannot afford to hire one. The second is the entirely erroneous belief that an editor will rewrite their book. That is not what editors do, though. No professional editor will change as much as a punctuation mark. What they do is suggest to the author what changes or corrections need to be made. It is then up to the author to implement them.

I wrote my first book without the services of an editor and without the services of a (professional) proof-reader, purely because of the first reason you mention here - it's very difficult to afford either of those services when they charge by the word and you've written a 275,000 word book.

The book I'm working on now is going to be big as well (although I'm hoping not quite as big) but I definitely think I'm going to invest some of the profits of the first one in an editor and proof-reader for the second.

I think that if an author intends to sell their book for the same price a commercially published---and professionally edited----book would cost then they have a responsibility to make it of equal quality. No one would purchase a car from a manufacturer that cost the same as an equivalent vehicle from some other company while being told that the manufacturer couldn't afford proper materials or competent workmen. It is not fair to the purchaser to be asked by an author to make allowances for their inability to produce a product worthy of the price they are asking.

I think that if an author intends to sell their book for the same price a commercially published---and professionally edited----book would cost then they have a responsibility to make it of equal quality. No one would purchase a car from a manufacturer that cost the same as an equivalent vehicle from some other company while being told that the manufacturer couldn't afford proper materials or competent workmen. It is not fair to the purchaser to be asked by an author to make allowances for their inability to produce a product worthy of the price they are asking.

I think that if an author intends to sell their book for the same price a commercially published---and professionally edited----book would cost then they have a responsibility to make it of equal quality. No one would purchase a car from a manufacturer that cost the same as an equivalent vehicle from some other company while being told that the manufacturer couldn't afford proper materials or competent workmen. It is not fair to the purchaser to be asked by an author to make allowances for their inability to produce a product worthy of the price they are asking.

I think that's true irrespective of the price.

You are absolutely right! If an author is going to charge anything for his or her book then it needs to be a professional-looking product.

Writing a novel is only 25% writing. Editing and proofreading are 50% and packaging is 25%.

After going through the edit process a few times and the packaging process a few times, your writing cannot help but change. After seeing the same mistakes and plot revisions change should be a good thing. Each book should get better and better if you are doing things right. This changes the style, hopefully for the better. The writing becomes easier and the editing for better writing can focus on more exacting standards. Shining the pearls rather than just washing off the mud.

In my deep and vast six months of experience this is what I have noticed anyway